USED

‘Everybody wants to be the DJ,’ as Soulwax once sang. And why not, of course. It’s just that there has to be some distinction. We’ve got nothing against the local DJ Snollebolle Kenny, who cranks up the entertainment value at retirement parties and shouts slogans like ‘Changez!’ and ‘I don’t see any hands in the air!’.  Fine. The Kempen prodigy USED, on the other hand, is a different kettle of fish. USED’s early singles (‘Better on my own’, ‘Where I belong’, ‘Red light green light’) served somewhat as the soundtrack to the collective mental blow that was the COVID-19 lockdown. Whenever we used to vent our frustrations in our diaries – we had hardly any other outlet – out of anger at the pandemic and being stuck at home forever, we’d put one of those tracks on endless repeat and go so wild that even the scales wondered if that lockdown wasn’t actually good for our weight. Not that we feel nostalgic for those days, but ‘Better on my own’ still feels, after all these years, like the opening dance of an impending liberation.  When the dark clouds of the epidemic were finally dispelled, it turned out: USED is here to stay, and with his hyperactive, nervous style, he’s now touring the world. He goes on to produce even more impressive singles (in that regard, listen to the impressive ‘You say’ from 2023) and a proper LP (‘Night shift’, 2024), whips up some great remixes (Black Eyed Peas! Kanye!), puts a microphone in the hands of the articulate Acid to create ‘Go Acid!’ (2022), and every time he’s on the bill at a dance party, hundreds or thousands of twenty-somethings dance away the last remnants of frustration from the two lost years of their youth, 2020 and 2021.  Following successful shows at the AB and the Lotto Arena, USED has long been ready for an upgrade: the man has been given the task and the honour of making Pommelien Thijs’s audience even crazier and more exhausted than it already was. That’s on Saturday 1 August. Will it be amazing? To answer with the enthusiastic words of DJ Snollebolle Kenny: “Yessss! Hatsiekideeee!”